Most people think about Linkedin.com in terms of its sitemap.
While the Linkedin sitemap is good for finding information about Linkedin.com, I prefer thinking about Linkedin in terms of an acronym I created for the word "BLOGS", (Business; Likeability; Objectives; Growth; Speed.)
Business – For some of us who've been on Linkedin a long time, it's easy to forget how challenging business was pre-Linkedin. It's incredible how much "dead-data" I have left over from my sales and recruiting days from the 80's and 90's. It took a lot of work to assemble all that stuff from so many places which would help us get to know our prospects and clients better. Now with the Linkedin platform, it's so easy to get living, relevant data that we can sometimes forget how to creatively use it for our businesses and careers.
Likeability – I like likeability! Wait. Let me rephrase that: I LOVE likeability! Linkedin is about being well, um, "linked in". Being "linked in" is about togetherness. Togetherness is the very essence of what a "business" is. "Business togetherness" is the whole purpose of the Linkedin platform. But what I like about the latest iteration of Linkedin is that I only have to be linked in with professionals I like. And I like this because likeability matters to me. And you know, even if you focused on working with only likable people and if you liked only 1 percent of Linkedin's 200 Million members, you could still end up with a HUGE personal network of likeable professionals on Linkedin! 2,000,000, actually. Which is the size of some fairly established networks.) By the way: I like introducing people I like! Wait. I LOVE introducing people I like! :-)
Objectives – If I establish my business objectives, if I get clear on them and then take them to Linkedin, I'm pretty sure that I can find someone among Linkedin's 300,000,000 members who can help me meet my most critical business objectives. And let's not forget: It's only by meeting your business objectives that can make Linkedin a joy. If you don't meet your business objectives, Linkedin is just an idea, a concept, an electronic addiction. But, IF you can MEET your objectives, Linkedin is a joy – pure joy. It's meeting the objectives that brings the joy.
Growth - I believe my small business would be better if it were bigger. Linkedin gives me the best chance I'm aware of to do just that: make my business better by growing my business via the people I meet through Linkedin. Linkedin has proven to be the most effective means of helping me grow my small business into a bigger, better business. (By the way: Bigger isn't just about adding new employees. Often it's about adding more clients.)
Speed - Speed matters in our businesses and in our careers. If speed didn't matter, of course everyone would be guaranteed to be successful merely because we could take all the time we wanted in building our businesses. But we don't have all the time in the world. Time pushes us. Time presses hard on us. Time crushes us. Time either helps us or hurts us. So, tools that can help up speed up the achievement of our business objectives are a joy. For me, personally, Linkedin is a joy in the sense of helping me speed up the acquisition of new clients and it helps me speed up my interaction with them. Linkedin is still the speediest professional way to meet the professionals I want to meet for my business without the risks associated with spamming. I've met tens of thousands of professional people via Linkedin that I wouldn't have met otherwise.
So, my Top 5 Joys of Linkedin can be summarized in B.L.O.G.S.
